shibori

Shrine Sale Stories…Recent Treasures

So I am continuing to love Instagram as it allows me to post shrine sale finds and other interesting items on a real-time basis which is just so satisfying. For those of you who have not taken the leap, I’ve been finding some great treasures for myself recently and I’d love to share them. My blue-green glass addiction is unabated and I found this chubby sake bottle last week. The two “ears” on either side of the bottle neck would have had a handle running through them originally. I think this one is perfectly shaped to be a lamp, but in the meantime, I will allow him to just hang out with his friends.

Speaking of lamps, this sake jug with its flowers, unusual in that most rustic jugs just have a manufacturer’s name or mark painted on them like these, is also a wonderful shape for a lamp.

I love its implied relation to an American classic, the stoneware jug. It took the floral decoration on it to make me see it that way.

Actual lamps have been another find, although I know I paid more than I should have for this purpley-indigo beauty. I have wanted a tiny task lamp for my desk at the beach house and looked everywhere the last two summers for one with no luck.

It will be absolutely perfect up here, so I had to have it.

I also couldn’t resist this minty green metal storage box. Don’t know what it is for or where exactly it will go, but I am sure I will find a place!

My lavender and blue dreams continue, with the markets fully supporting them. Lavender is not a typical color in Japanese textiles – it really is rare to see it – but I found an extraordinary lavender and blue tsutusgaki furoshiki (a traditional wrapping cloth made with a hand drawn rice paste resist technique) with a soft shibori faded background. I was having trouble convincing myself to buy it (“Do I really need it?”) when I realized I had an item stalker. You know what that is, someone who has spotted something you are looking at and decided they want it, so they follow you around the booth hoping you will put it down so they can grab it. An item stalker always helps to force a purchase!

Since then I’ve found a length of typical shibori (Japanese tie-dye), but in lavender and blue.

While I’m at it, here’s another really pretty and detailed piece…

…and did someone say pop of color? Obviously May Daouk‘s living room is still on my mind when you look at these colors together.

My spate of finding incredible Japanese prints – impeccably framed no less – at Kawagoe continues unabated. These small lithographs aren’t stand out pieces alone, but as part of a larger gallery wall, I know they will be fantastic.

I am not familiar with the artist and haven’t had time yet to research it, but I do love them.

So have you made any great finds recently? I’d love to hear about them!

May 1, 2013 By tokyojinja in Glass, Lighting, Porcelain and Pottery, Shrine Sales and Flea Markets, Textiles 7 Comments Tags: fabric, Japanese art, japanese prints, Japanese textiles, lamps, lavender, light fixtures, sake bottle, sake jugs, shibori, tsutsugaki, vintage fabrics

The ASIJ Quilt…Carpe Triem

So I’ve been making lots of teasing comments about koi and kasuri lately, with a very good reason. This year, our annual quilt for The American School in Japan Gala fundraiser is a deep indigo pool made of kasuri, with three charming carp frolicking in the rain. Koi are the beloved ornamental varieties of common carp that are kept as pets in ponds and the word koi is itself a homophone for another Japanese word that means “affection” or “love”; koi are therefore symbols of love and friendship in Japan. The name of the quilt, Carpe “Triem”, reminds us to seize the day (or seize the quilt!) and is a play on our trio of friends. Inspiration came in many forms, from modern woodblock prints, like this one, ‘Pillow Talk” by Daniel Kelly…

…to ‘Whisper whisper 7’ amongst others from Kaneko Kunio.

Koinobori, meaning ‘carp streamer’ in Japanese, are carp-shaped wind socks traditionally flown to celebrate Boy’s Day (now called Children’s Day), which falls on May 5th every year. The carp has become the symbol of Boys’ Day because the Japanese consider it the most spirited of fish—so full of energy and power that it can fight its way up swift-running streams and cascades. Because of its strength and determination to overcome all obstacles, it stands for courage and the ability to attain high goals.

We also had high goals for ourselves as quilters, wanting to create a very individual and special quilt while at the same time longing to do another boro (rag) background quilt, featuring vintage indigo textiles, a bit reminiscent of the beloved Dragon quilt of 2007. I was lucky enough to come across a few great pieces of kasuri, the Japanese form of ikat, in which the thread is dyed prior to weaving. Kendra had some other gorgeous pieces in her stash and we were easily able to assemble the patchwork background from a myriad of pieces and patterns.

Using some photos of real koi, Julie drew our koi on graph paper free hand – she is so amazing!

I figured once we were using such gorgeous fabric for the background, there was no chance modern fabric could hold up its head against it. So back out to the shrine sales I went, in search of antique and vintage shibori (Japanese tie-dye), brocades and other silks. While the fabric would be gorgeous I knew the quilters would be hating me a bit as silks are so hard to work with.

The patterns in the shibori was perfect in giving almost a literal effect of scales. And the bold colors – oranges, yellows and golds – against the deep indigo was spectacular. Just trying it out by draping a fish shape had us all excited.

As we started late this year and the Gala was a week earlier than normal and we planned for the koi to exuberantly overlap the borders, we had to work a bit out-of-order this year and put the borders on early.

Julie’s husband enlisted the local copy shop to blow up the hand sketched koi, one graph paper square to one inch and we were able to use them as patterns.

The day we spent cutting the fabrics to create the fish was my favorite quilt day in all nine years I have been working on the ASIJ quilts.

With each fabric we tried to bring out its innate nature…

…and have the details suggest the very details found on the fish.

We used iron-on stabilizer to give the pieces some weight and make them opaque.

We basted the quilt top to a simply patterned dark blue background and placed the fish into their new home in the pond.

As we loved the echo quilting we did last year, we decided to do it again – this time as raindrops on the pond. Here you can see the circles marked out at one inch intervals. If you look closely you can also see the detailed quilting in the fish fins.

I just love this detail shot with the shibori circles reading as fish scales and the rain drops quilted into the kasuri.

The crowning touch was finding a perfect silky orange binding – I don’t know how we got so lucky! Not a perfect frontal photo, but the slight angle brings out the details of the echo quilted raindrops.

This quilt, with its evocative design and meticulous craftsmanship, masterfully captures and conveys our long-lasting affection for Japan.

More in-progress details can be found over at My Quilt Diary and A Quilter By Night.

Feb 26, 2013 By tokyojinja in Artist Spotlight, Design Motif, Expat Life, Textiles 24 Comments Tags: ASIJ gala quilt, carp, Julie Fukuda, kasuri, koi, koinobori, quilting, quilts, shibori

Everyone’s Got the Blues…Indigo Pillow Round-Up

Was it this room in the October 2010 issue of Lonny that started it?

Or this one in the November 2010 issue of Elle Decor?

Either way, I don’t know the answer, but it is no longer just my own selective perception. I figure everyone must be tired of ikat and suzani throw pillows, as every time I turn around (or actually, click on a link) I come across indigo pillows, new and vintage, shibori or tie dyed, sashiko stitched, wax-resist dyed, printed and other techniques, all reminiscent of or actually made from Japanese textiles. Not a new topic for me at all, but I do think they have gone from being a rarely seen item to being prevalent and readily available. So if you are not here in Japan where you can stop by a shrine sale and pick up Japanese textiles to sew into pillows, or if you like your pillows ready-made, here’s a look at what’s out there.

There are certain places you’d expect to find them of course…John Robshaw for instance (his room is the top one above). The website has tie dyed pillows for sale which I won’t call shibori as I believe they are made in India, not Japan.

Jayson Home & Garden still stocks the Zoe tie dyed pillow in the second photo, but unfortunately they are out of the blue and only have it in sage and plum. Don’t despair as Roni over at The Loaded Trunk has a nice selection of hand tied indigo pillows as well as a full assortment of Moroccan, Kuba cloth, Hmong, Afghan, Mexican, Indian – you name it – pillows from around the world.

Here’s a close up of the big 24 inch pillow on the floor in the photo above. It would make a good substitute for the ones in the Elle Decor photo.

Anupama also has a wide range of global pillows, including this typical shibori circles pillow…

…and this more unusual beehive shibori pattern.

Big shibori furoshiki (wrapping cloths) make great floor pillows as shown here by these from Ouno Design. I recently sourced a great furoshiki that designer and friend Maja Smith is making into one for her Lake Tahoe home. Looking forward to photos of that!

One Kings Lane has had some very authentic looking pillows from a shop called Viridian made from vintage tsutsugaki (literally, tube drawing) textiles, a paste resist method of decoration…

…as well as others made using the katazome (stencil paste resist) method from Erin Taylor of Botanik.

There are also some boro (tattered rags) styles too.

Even mainstream retailers are getting into the game. While Anthropologie is no longer stocking the Japanese inspired bedding and pillows they had last year, Serena and Lily, normally so preppy and demure, has been stepping up their game with an online bazaar filled with vintage accessories as well as their line of linens and furniture. They have also caught a bit of that boro fever…

…and have some new Japanese inspired textiles.

Even Ralph Lauren isn’t being left out with his Indigo Modern Stripe Collection, a dip dyed pillow and sheeting set.

May 20, 2012 By tokyojinja in Color, Interior Design, Textiles 9 Comments Tags: indigo, John Robshaw, pillows, Serena and Lily, shibori, textiles, tie dye

A Little Shibori Feeling From Eskayel and Anthropologie

Shiboru in Japanese means “to wring, squeeze, press.” Although shibori used to be designated as a particular group of resist- dyed textiles, the verb root of the word emphasizes the action performed on cloth, the process of manipulating fabric. Rather than treating cloth as a two-dimensional surface, with shibori it is given a three-dimensional form by folding, crumpling,stitching, plaiting, or plucking and twisting.
-Shibori Textile Museum

Everywhere I turned this summer, Brooklyn based design studio Eskayel was featured, from apartment therapy, to House Beautiful and Lonny. Artist Shanan Campanaro’s unusual abstract patterns drawn from her paintings and then digitally manipulated and expanded as wallpaper and fabric are utterly riveting. I received numerous emails from friends and readers who also had noticed it in the press and wanted to alert me to its beauty.

While her textiles and papers are not in any way shibori (tie-dye) related, every time I looked at them, I couldn’t help but be reminded of it.

Perhaps it is the rich indigo blue colorways?

Or the Rorschach quality the patterns share with shibori?

Here are two classic shibori patterns, tegumo and hinode for comparison with the pillows above. Are you feeling it too?

Even this Galileo basket feels Japanese in shape and nature.

If you are loving her patterns but not interested in indigo, be sure to check out the full website as there are other gorgeous colors and designs.

Last June, the design team at Anthropologie, fascinated by an antique piece of Japanese cloth, traveled to Kyoto in search of more information and inspiration. The result was their “Arimatsu” bedding line. The history of Arimatsu, a town known as the center of shibori, dates back to 1608 and it has been a dyeing center ever since.

A room view of the bedding from the catalog.

You know me, I cannot ever resist an interesting lamp shade. This Arashi shade has classic shibori details. Love the pleating too! Hmmm…where could I use it?

Shibori is not Anthro’s only inspiration. Their Nightbloom bedding series is based on a few Japanese motifs. The central medallions are stylized chrysanthemums, the kamon of the emperor. And the circular pattern is a complicated version of shippou-tsunagi (seven treasures pattern), just recently shown here.